Guenther Steiner will not return as Team Principal of MoneyGram Haas F1 Team.
Steiner held the position at the sole American-backed Formula One team since its inception in 2014. The team’s former director of engineering, Ayao Komatsu, will replace the Italian-American in the role, effective immediately.
Reports from BBC Sport say that Haas did not fire the 58-year-old former team principal. Rather, Steiner’s contract was up with the team after 10 years at the helm, and the team chose to not extend him another offer.
Haas has finished at the bottom of Formula One’s Constructors’ Championship standings in two of the last three seasons.
“Moving forward as an organization it was clear we need to improve our on-track performances,” team owner Gene Haas said in a statement. “In appointing Ayao Komatsu as Team Principal we fundamentally have engineering at the heart of our management.”
Haas F1 team scoring history under Guenther Steiner
- March 20, 2016: Romain Grosjean finishes sixth at Australian Grand Prix, scoring the first points for Haas in team’s Formula One debut.
- 2016 season: Haas finishes with 29 points – all from Grosjean – and eighth place in Constructors’ Championship standings
- 2017 season: 47 points, eighth in Constructors’ Championship
- 2018 season: 93 points, fifth in Constructors’ Championship
- 2019 season: 28 points, ninth in Constructors’ Championship
- 2020 season (abbreviated): 3 points, ninth in Constructors’ Championship
- 2021 season: 0 points, 10th in Constructors’ Championship
- 2022 season: 37 points, eighth in Constructors’ Championship
- 2023 season: 12 points, 10th in Constructors’ Championship
